Helen Davis Zettle

Helen Davis Zettle, a longtime UB administrative assistant known
as “The Voice of Norton Union,” died June 22 at the
home of her daughter in Williamsville after a short illness. She
was 88.

Born in Berlin, Md., Zettle grew up in the Philadelphia area
after moving there with her family at a young age. After high
school, she took a job manufacturing wartime goods at the Baldwin
Locomotive Works in Eddystone, Pa., where she met her husband
of 41 years, Vernon C. Zettle, who was kept out of World War II due
to an eye condition.

She and her husband eventually settled in Buffalo, where Zettle
held a variety of administrative positions at UB, first at the old
Norton Union, the former student union on the South Campus, where
her job as public address announcer earned her the nickname
“The Voice of Norton Union,” and later at the School of
Dental Medicine.

Zettle was a voracious reader and frequently audited classes at
UB. She and her husband loved to travel, and made trips throughout
Europe and the Middle East.